'Never again' must be demolished or overhauled. It's more than a sensation issue.

[neobrick]

As there are always people who deem any doubter to a game machenism is just someone unworthy of the difficulty whining around. I need to write this down first: 1. There ARE arguments and reasoning in this thread. Read before you judge me. 2.I already had over 150h of gameplay and have seen much as the past year proceeded.

What is 'never agian'.

In case you want to keep the surprise, I have marked the explanation as spoiler: Never again is a machenism activates after a successful raid in Darkest Dungeon area, the team you used are banned from DD. In the meantime, they no longer occupy roster space and still useable in other areas.

What do the developers promise to bring with this machenism?

According to some of their own comments, the goals of this machenism includes adding consistency and diversity. The former means by addressing such permanent mental trauma, it adds additional lovecraftian experiences. For the latter it means by not allowing players with a small dedicated group of heros to proceed, one now must raise a lot more heros and probably different classes and compositions.

Does it deliever?

In short, NO.

Why and how?

In regard to diversity, this machenism detroys diversity much more than it creates. Even under this machenism a diversed roster is not more encouraged than before. There is still virtually no reward if you deliberately raise a diversed roster. But now there is one thing nearly everyone has to do: do additional leveling to form additional teams. 'Not encouraging diversity'+'further limit player options'=kill diversity in the name of diversity.

On story consistency, I would like to quote a thread from another post:

Arcangelo님이 먼저 게시:

What I find funny is that you have these, let's say, 16 legendary heroes, who fought monsters and unspeakable horrors, who faced many adversities, hunger, diseases, who were challenged both physically and mentally. They fought and trained for many many Weeks, maybe years in order to destroy the Final Evil.
Some of them die in the DD, some of them win and go "Never Again".
Then, a bunch of newbies come to town, they get powerleveled in just a few Weeks and beat the most difficult level of the game facing the worst horrors ever. xD

Is it so bad that a demolish is neccessary?

Please do understand, when a machenism threaten some fundamental characteristics of the game that made the game and community what they are today, then it is a threat to what we charish and bound about the game.

I don't know how many of us are drown to this game by its 'Roguelike' or 'Tabletop RPG alike' gameplay. I am one of those and I know there are many others like me. An essential element of this genre is diversity, or freedom on choices. And that's what this game was known to deliever throughout numerous reviews in the past year. One shouldn't be rigged against just because he has different perspective on playstyles and what fun is. Unfortunatley, 'Never agian' is exactly such a rigging, rigging to punish successful runs.

Forced additional playthrough time is another concern here. Even with the recently popular 'mentoring' (aka. high res. heros take a newbie into champ dungeons for fast leveling), an additional 4 runs is still needed. If including the gold farming and quirk adjustment, it shall at least require 3 hours to just have another run in DD. And where do you see such 'forced additional time/leveling' most often? MMOs. This is a typical MMO grinding shanenigan and is immediately inconsistent if we put it in this scenario.

Some more worrisome concerns

One doesn't have to be a genius to figure out what this machenism may bring. However, judging from some feedbacks from John, the developers are still pretty confident and, to a certain extent, satisfied with what never again has brought. And they even keep preaching the diversity they never bring with this very machenism. This actually made me worry about their sincerity and what this game may be led to in future versions.

Such concern can be further backed by the fact that they deliberately brought a grinding shanenigan from MMOs. Now the future of this game is highly doubtable. After modding comes, it may well end up as a mediocre sandbox rpg in a fancy shell of artworks.

Is there a possible fix?

If you mean having limitations on A-teams and in the meantime not affecting the diversity or forcing playthrough time to pointlessly increase, then there are possible fixes. I have already seen some interesting proposals in this respect.
But please note that 'Never agian' is a machenism fundamentally agianst such requirement. A solution overcoming the major flaws will be more like a rebuild after demolition, rather than patching or fixing.

Please join the disscussion and share your ideas about these issues. May our voices be heard.

[Kain]

screeg님이 먼저 게시:

What's Darkest Arkham?

Maybe he tried to make a Lovecraft reference but mispelled Arkham?

[JessRivers]

After mellowing out a bit on the mechanic, I don't think it's as destructive as the OP claims, but it can definitely be a momentum killer in the final DD push. Combined with the auto-death on retreat from DD, and it creates a huge "hero sink" that's just wrecked my will to try again because I've lost all my tanks.

I had a full roster of 25 Res6 heroes when the final patch dropped, and I've lost 3 from retreats, 7 from combat, and 6 more to "Never Again." From those, I've got two tanks in Never Again status that would have let me have another 2 attempts at the DD, and one of the retreats claimed another tank. That's three additional attempts I could have made to clear the last two missions that I can't make because of a couple of restrictions no other dungeon in the game has.

I think those mechanics have a place in NG+, where time and lives are limited. However, I think they should be a toggle option for the normal campaign because ultimately, I want to see the ending of this story. And isn't that what is universally praised about this game?

[screeg]

Kain님이 먼저 게시:

screeg님이 먼저 게시:

What's Darkest Arkham?

Maybe he tried to make a Lovecraft reference but mispelled Arkham?

Turns out it's this.

[neobrick]

screeg님이 먼저 게시:

Kain님이 먼저 게시:

Maybe he tried to make a Lovecraft reference but mispelled Arkham?

Turns out it's this.

Hahah you found it. Sorry for the mispelling.

[geepope]

The amount of time it takes to raise 16 maxed out heroes is less than the amount of time it takes to kill all bosses. So "Never Again" does not increase the length of the game for players intent on clearing out every dungeon, because by the time they're done with that they can (and should) have more than enough heroes to take on the Darkest Dungeon. Personally, I wish that tracking down bosses and leveling up both took less time, but that's not the fault of "Never Again."

You also seem to be arguing that the "Never Again" trait fails to encourage diversity because players can still just repeatedly raise copies of the same 4-man team to send into the Darkest Dungeon. But unless someone specifically wants to repeatedly level up cloned teams (and you obviously don't, since you're complaining about it), this definitely does encourage players to branch out and use more classes.

For those of us who already like using a large roster and lots of different classes, though, Never Again is a great gift. Otherwise, we'd be merrily be romping through the game up until the end only to be told "Oh, by the way? You only need your best 4 guys and the rest of your roster is irrelevant now. All those other characters you painstakingly raised instead of bulldozing everything with your A-Team? Hope you had fun, because that was all a big waste of your time."

There have been some decent alternative proposals floated, such as having "Never Again" heroes take a stacking stress hit or other significant penalty rather than banning them outright. Mechanically this is a really solid idea and is more elegant than the arbitrary ban. However, it is important to consider what a game's mechanics are communicating to the player, and it's a lot easier to communicate that they can't use a single party for the entire Darkest Dungeon than it is that they shouldn't. A lot of RPG players are going to predisposed to stick to a single primary team whenever possible and may well wind up being even more frustrated by a system that lets them send their favorites back in but penalizes them for it than one that doesn't let them do it in the first place.

There's also the option to remove the penalty altogether and make DD like every other game out there, making it largely irrelevant to upgrade your roster or use more than a handful of characters. Yawn.

[neobrick]

Pothocket님이 먼저 게시:

neobrick님이 먼저 게시:

I don't think I made much assumption in my post, probably less than you made on me.
Is actual reading so difficult nowadays?

Or you could have commented on my point about the difference between already having a leveled estate and starting from the beginning.

I'm curious about that. Who here has started a new estate when the full game released, beaten it, and what did you think of the pacing when tackling on the end-game content?

It's irrelevant. Because the basic features of never again don''t change with different profile condition. It may feel different, but all the anti-diversity nature and forced additional play time still exist.

[Kain]

neobrick님이 먼저 게시:

screeg님이 먼저 게시:

Turns out it's this.

Hahah you found it. Sorry for the mispelling.

Awesome, they even added Joe Diamond.

[Pothocket]

neobrick님이 먼저 게시:

Pothocket님이 먼저 게시:

Or you could have commented on my point about the difference between already having a leveled estate and starting from the beginning.

I'm curious about that. Who here has started a new estate when the full game released, beaten it, and what did you think of the pacing when tackling on the end-game content?

It's irrelevant. Because the basic features of never again don''t change with different profile condition. It may feel different, but all the anti-diversity nature and forced additional play time still exist.

I know never-again doesn't change but there is a difference between having already done all the content and having no reason to do any runs other than those in the final area, and an estate where I still have content to complete and something for those with never-again to prove useful with.

[neobrick]

geepope님이 먼저 게시:

The amount of time it takes to raise 16 maxed out heroes is less than the amount of time it takes to kill all bosses. So "Never Again" does not increase the length of the game for players intent on clearing out every dungeon, because by the time they're done with that they can (and should) have more than enough heroes to take on the Darkest Dungeon. Personally, I wish that tracking down bosses and leveling up both took less time, but that's not the fault of "Never Again."

You also seem to be arguing that the "Never Again" trait fails to encourage diversity because players can still just repeatedly raise copies of the same 4-man team to send into the Darkest Dungeon. But unless someone specifically wants to repeatedly level up cloned teams (and you obviously don't, since you're complaining about it), this definitely does encourage players to branch out and use more classes.

For those of us who already like using a large roster and lots of different classes, though, Never Again is a great gift. Otherwise, we'd be merrily be romping through the game up until the end only to be told "Oh, by the way? You only need your best 4 guys and the rest of your roster is irrelevant now. All those other characters you painstakingly raised instead of bulldozing everything with your A-Team? Hope you had fun, because that was all a big waste of your time."

There have been some decent alternative proposals floated, such as having "Never Again" heroes take a stacking stress hit or other significant penalty rather than banning them outright. Mechanically this is a really solid idea and is more elegant than the arbitrary ban. However, it is important to consider what a game's mechanics are communicating to the player, and it's a lot easier to communicate that they can't use a single party for the entire Darkest Dungeon than it is that they shouldn't. A lot of RPG players are going to predisposed to stick to a single primary team whenever possible and may well wind up being even more frustrated by a system that lets them send their favorites back in but penalizes them for it than one that doesn't let them do it in the first place.

There's also the option to remove the penalty altogether and make DD like every other game out there, making it largely irrelevant to upgrade your roster or use more than a handful of characters. Yawn.

The stacking stress proposal is also my favourite alternative.

The potential of never agian still remains to be examined. But I don't think it may be any good. What it punishes is essentially a successful run, and what it ecourages is a reconsidered & time repeated run. I would say even stack a stress damage on heros who share the same classes as successful runners or a buff on different compositions may do a better job in such respect.

One thing I didn't mention is my own case. I found that when trying different composition on DD the casualty is very high because the composition needs to be tested. And with a diversed roster, some hero classes are thus lost forever. And those proven potent... still require some grinding to raise some additional meatbags, as the veterans are now banned.
Yeah, I am punished by this machenism for diversed playstyle.

Another fundamental thing is a player should have the liberty to play in a style which the developers and the majority may not hold as fun. I charish this very dearly for a roguelike or a TRPG alike game.

[PortalShifter]

Never Again should be changed to "I'm freaked for a month but then I got my ♥♥♥♥ together and I'm ready to go back in the dungeon"

[neobrick]

Pothocket님이 먼저 게시:

neobrick님이 먼저 게시:

It's irrelevant. Because the basic features of never again don''t change with different profile condition. It may feel different, but all the anti-diversity nature and forced additional play time still exist.

I know never-again doesn't change but there is a difference between having already done all the content and having no reason to do any runs other than those in the final area, and an estate where I still have content to complete and something for those with never-again to prove useful with.

Yes. That was what I was referring to when saying 'feels different'.
Disrespect on choice freedom? Forced additional time? Still terrible in such regards as I posted in the beginning.

[redhookjohn]

Hey gang!

Never Again is an aspect of the game that we are still talking about, so discussion on the topic is absolutely welcomed. As I mentioned in the other post and both PotHocket and Geepope have pointed out, there are some upsides to the Never Again Champions. Should the upsides be bigger? Possibly. As a matter of fact it's something we are still thinking about internally.

We don't have anything to share as to what direction we are leaning, but know that after we get the support issues resolved, and the localization improved, this is something along with a few other tweaks around progression and time, that we want to look into.

So please be civil and respect each others opinions on the topic.

[neobrick]

redhookjohn님이 먼저 게시:

Hey gang!

Never Again is an aspect of the game that we are still talking about, so discussion on the topic is absolutely welcomed. As I mentioned in the other post and both PotHocket and Geepope have pointed out, there are some upsides to the Never Again Champions. Should the upsides be bigger? Possibly. As a matter of fact it's something we are still thinking about internally.

We don't have anything to share as to what direction we are leaning, but know that after we get the support issues resolved, and the localization improved, this is something along with a few other tweaks around progression and time, that we want to look into.

So please be civil and respect each others opinions on the topic.

Personally I would say it's not on the correct course. Even enhancing mentoring further may not help much since it doesn't change the óne-shot judgement' characteristic. A proper overhaul will be more like demolish and then rebuild.

I am with the stacking stress on neveragain heros so it can be shown as not encouraging. In the meantime additional rewards and buffs can be applied if the player use different combinations

[geepope]

neobrick님이 먼저 게시:

One thing I didn't mention is my own case. I found that when trying different composition on DD the casualty is very high because the composition needs to be tested. And with a diversed roster, some hero classes are thus lost forever. And those proven potent... still require some grinding to raise some additional meatbags, as the veterans are now banned.
Yeah, I am punished by this machenism for diversed playstyle.

This overlooks the fact that the various DD missions vary noticeably in terms of enemies and dungeon layout, so beating a mission with one class doesn't necessarily mean you'll want the same class next time for a much different mission.

The one thing I will agree on is that the combination of blind missions + high level requirements + permadeath is not very interesting or fun game design. You can call up a stagecoach full of newbies and throw them into the DD for suicide scouting but they're not likely to make it far enough to provide any really useful information. As I said I don't think the stacking stress penalty is a cure-all but the one aspect of it I like is that it would let you send successful DD teams back in for scouting purposes: it would be a poor strategy to rely on half-crazed veterans to carry you through the dungeon, but they'd definitely be strong enough to make a decent dent and get substantial intel on the layout and enemies before they die.

(This would somewhat hurt the tension of the DD, but it does at least force a decent thematic choice: do I send my victorious heroes back to the dungeon of madness to die a horrible death to pave the way for others, or do I let them live in what remains of their peace?)

[Radene]

Make it an option you can toggle on or off, like corpses.
Not like it's the first time a divisive mechanic popped up.

The OP having written a wall of text doesn't make him right (or wrong), because, and you might want to sit down for this revelation, different people have different tastes and preferences.

So make it an option, those who want to play with Never Again can do so, and those who want to turn it off, can turn it off. Problem solved.